Shoota_77

Ha ha, cheers mate. Only time will tell if I do it justice or make it look worse!! I'm hoping to lay some paint this afternoon if I get the other bits and pieces (door hinges, rad support panel, etc) stripped and ready for paint. Wish me luck!!!!

Might be able to see more of our fresh engine bay paint if we don't have stonkingbig c/c's covering it all up!

I'm in the process of transplanting my fuel tank into the engine bay specifically as a catch can, should look nice.

Righto, who's already forked out their folding for a set of the newly announced PRP vented/baffled cam covers? I will but need to let the sting of 2 months hard part gathering to subside a little before I take the plunge! They will be an awesome thing if they deliver what they promise being minimal oil leaving the breathers. Saves having to have a catch can the size of a fuel tank in the engine bay! https://www.platinumracingproducts.com/products/platinum-racing-products-rb-twin-cam-baffled-cam-covers

Still waiting on my tie down point panel from US. I was hoping it would arrive before I slap the epoxy on this weekend but not looking likely unfortunately. I've finished the prep and now pretty much finished masking the doors and under the vehicle at the rear where I'm not (currently....) painting. I'm VERY confident I will do the back while I'm at it but I'll get the front all coated, seam sealed, etc before deciding if I do it now or down the track. The way I've prepared everything it will be very easy to just do the rear section as a separate job. I'm putting in a non V-Spec mechanical diff, Hicas lockbar, AN8 fuel hardlines (supply and return) and a Frenchy's in tank fuel setup before it goes back on the road so I definitely need to remove the subframe and fuel tank regardless of whether I paint the arse end or not. Obviously would be dumb to NOT do it while it's all sitting on the ground but history has told me if I get too balls deep in something that is when I lose interest and get over it. I refuse to let that happen this time around so playing it safe! My masking job is as ugly as a 90 year old mans ball sack but as long as it keeps the paint out of where it shouldn't be then it's done its job! It's quite tricky masking up to an exterior edge where I'm not painting. I'm using that round soft edge foam tape which hopefully does a nice transition that can't be seen....

Hi guys, as per above I'm chasing a set of R33 GT-R front inner guard liners. The larger front section, not the skinny longer section. Wanting good ones, not clapped out ones with big holes or multiple broken tabs, etc. Sucks that you can still buy GTS-T liners brand new cheap as but they don't make GT-R ones any more.... Many thanks! Ewan.

Nice mate, she's looking good!!!! I just bought one of the PRP a/c compressor relocation kits too. Sorry I should read back and/or remember but are running electric p/s now?

Wow, what a journey! She looks nice after the paint job, nice and white again! I'm sure it will be pretty amazing to see it roll out of the container back in Oz! What took you to Georgia in the first place? Not a country I know a lot about really.

The scraping, sanding, die grinder pad buzzing goes on and on and on.... I really didn't expect it to take so long! I reckon I've put 30 hours so far into just the pre-paint prep work. I'm finally at the point of masking everything up in preparation for the epoxy. Just need the weather to warm up a bit so I can do it after work one night. Epoxy doesn't like being sprayed under 15 degrees (apparently!) so need a warm afternoon. Because I'm painting all along the sills it makes sense to do the top of the sill as well rather than masking a line down the middle of it. Ran into a drama on the drivers side where the striker plate bolts were seized to the body. Even using an impact driver (proper punch style one, not a rattle gun!) but they would not budge. Ended up stripping out the head of both screws. Drilled the centre out of two 12mm ID nuts (to make more room to weld through) and welded them on to the head of the bolts. Between the heat of welding it stretching the bolt and having two nuts to swing off they came straight out thankfully. Wasn't looking forward to have to fix the threads if that didn't work... It's been pretty frightening how quickly flash rust sets in when you've sanded back to bare metal. A few times I've had to sand areas back that have a nice (not nice...) rusty red tinge to them. I've been SUPER conscious of not touching anything with bare hands while I'm working on it but things are still flash rusting pretty quickly. Praying for some warmer days late in the week and finally seal everything up.

I just don't know when to stop..... A lot of the purpose behind stripping it right back was caused by my own mistakes about 8 years ago (when the thought of a restoration of sorts was not even a twinkle in my ballsack) when I thought I was helping by spraying around a bit of rattle can paint while the engine was out for the very first time. It no doubt looked better than it did at the time but that paint just didn't stick all that well so fast forward to now I had to scrape heaps of it off with a scraper which was mind numbingly tedious! I then decided I wasn't happy with that so ended up attacking the whole bay with a scotch brite pad on the die grinder before then hand sanding the whole thing again with 60 grit sandpaper. Apart from welding up a few holes the engine bay is pretty much done and ready for dusting off, wax and greaser wipe down then masking up prior to Epoxy. I'll scuff/sand the wheel arches and underneath tomorrow then it's paint time. Probably not till next week as I've got my kids basketball tournament all weekend so will be away. Would have smashed out a heap if not for that. Right, I'm off to bed...

I actually caused those surface rust spots you can see when I was cleaning it prior to commencing paint prep. I used a few harsh degreasers and it was brutal on any bare metal spots. They rusted instantly. I've rust treated those spots and any other visible rust. I'll be seam sealing every single metal join in the car so once that's done and all sealed up with 5-6 layers of paint there won't be any dramas for another 25 years. If rust is dry when it's coated and has no access to moisture beyond that point, it can't spread any further.

Mate she's gunna be a stunner once it's all done! Looking great.

Very hungover today but determined to crack on when I'd much prefer to suffer in my jocks on the couch and watch YouTube videos of other people moving forwards on their builds but this the new me! For now.... I'm tipping I'll be back there in a few hours. Got shipping notification that the new panel has been shipped from the Nissan dealer in the States so removed the old tow point (jacking point...... 😏) panel. Came off pretty easily to be honest. I've had a bit of experience drilling out spot welds on my first Datto Ute so remembered some of what I learnt back then (10-12 years ago..). Bit of cleaning up the remnants of the spot weld and she'll be ready to weld the new panel on once it arrives.

Thanks mate! Hopefully my high quality, boutique spray “boof” inspires some quality painting! 😂 Bought all the paint (epoxy primer, primer filler/surfacer, QM1 base coat, 2K clear and all associated reducers, hardeners, etc today. Fark that hurt a little….. About $1000 all up and that is only enough to do about 50% of the car…. After buying everything (spray gun, sandpaper, masking tapes and plastics, the tarps for my spray booth, the paint, etc, etc, etc) it DEFINITELY would have been cheaper to pay someone else to do it but where’s the fun in that? I’ll still have all of the gear to be able to tackle more painting jobs plus I’m looking forward to gaining some new skills during the painting process. But also dreading the fact that I could completely fark it at the same time!! 😂 Only time will tell I guess! Oh another interesting fact I learnt today. There are about 5 or 6 DIFFERENT shades of QM1. Apparently it’s pretty common to have same paint code and multiple different versions. Shouldn’t that mean it’s a different paint code….. Bloody dumb if you ask me! I went with the whitest, cleanest looking version which is straight white with a dash of black in it versus the others which have varying shades of yellow in them.

I guess the key to this is that there IS a very slight ripple in the panel that the tow point is connected to but given the amount of force require to bend that jacking point, if it did no more than a tiny ripple from that, jacking it up from there is going to be a walk in the park! In saying that I’ve never used it as a jacking point but I’ll be forever impressed by it’s strength standing up to my sledgie action so won’t have any hesitations in the future! 😂

Yeah for sure. It's incredibly hardened steel so would have bruised coccyx from that hit! As above, based on how hard I hit it with the sledgie and not budging it, jacking it up from that point shouldn't be an issue!

#prosprayboof Put my tarps up tonight to create my "spray booth". It's really bizarre how much it transforms the feel of the shed! Obviously I'll either rope or stick each section of the tarps when I'm spraying but make it easier to move around the shed being able move between the sections. The very last tarp I've only attached one end for now and when I'm painting will swing diagonally to the corner of the shed next to the roller door to funnel the air in from that direction and out the other end. Still need to have a clean up and move some more stuff around to the other side of the shed but it feels a little more paint ready now! I've decided I'm replacing the right tow hook panel. As you can see prior to my ownership it's copped a fair whack on a gutter or something to bend it back that far. I smacked it with my heaviest mini sledge hammer and barely budged it! They're NLA from Nissan in Australia but I think I've found one at Nissan in the US. Only $160 and about 10 spot welds to drill out and then reweld to replace it. I'd never forgive myself if I did all this work and didn't do it! This is what the new panel looks like- Terrible picture but you get the idea of the size of the panel that needs to be replaced. Still haven't got the paint yet. Hopefully get to the paint shop before the weekend. I've got an unpainted Skoda bonnet to have a practice squirt on before I fling any paint at my car!.

Will do. The concept is in my head but not sure if it will translate to reality!

Thanks guys, much appreciated! It was a slog I can tell you! Especially in all the ribs along the underside. They could have made it dead flat to make my life easier!! Having a play around with the sills at the moment trying to straighten them up a bit. Mainly just each end is where the damage is. I want to get them a bit better but not waste days on them! I had a bit of a crack with locking pliers and a slide hammer which was mildly successful in pulling them back into place a little but they need more work before I'm happy. I've got another puller concept in mind utilising 3 locking pliers and an engine support bar pulling up against the underside of the hoist arms that allows me to pull down on the 3 locking pliers with nuts that are on a threaded rod that is screwed into the bottom of the locking pliers where the adjuster bolt normally goes. Very hard to explain without photos! If I go with it I'll post up some photos so my rambling actually makes some sort of sense!! I got a heap of tarps from Bunnings yesterday to make up my makeshift "spray booth". I'm more doing it to stop getting overspray on everything other than the car rather than the goal of a perfect paint job! I'm pretty much going to make the shed a 'wind tunnel' so lining the walls of half of the shed so air comes in one roller door and then flows out the other roller door at the other end of the shed. It won't be perfect and will probably still mean I get a bit of shit in the paint but meh, can't get it all your own way!!

Wow...... There's two days of my life I'll never get back.... That is a very dirty, fiddly and physically demanding job! I can see why most people would do underbody on a rotisserie. Very hard on the arms, shoulders and back. Not gunna lie, pretty happy the vast majority of the stripping down part of it is done. Theres not one spec of body deadener left under the car (up to the fuel tank). Hopefully get some Epoxy Primer during the week and get a couple of coats over everything before I get any flash rust seeing it's pretty wet at the moment. Seam sealer and body filler will go very the top of the primer then base, then clear. Probably going to Raptor liner the wheel arches and under the car. Having a full 3 layer paint finish and then Raptor should seal everything up for the next 25+ plus years.

I have made many, many plans and stuck to about none of them! 😂

Yes, they're a very slippery slope. Every. Single. Time..... 🙂

Hey, don’t you hit me with sensible comments! 😂 Where do you stop though? I was first going to NOT paint then engine bay, then I was going to paint the bay but just to the floor, then I was going to halfway along the car, then I thought “stuff it, I’ll go to just before the fuel tank! You are right but there really isn’t much in the way of visible body beyond that point so if I don’t do it now I’m not fussed. I’ll get everything that I’ve committed to fully prepped and ready to go and if I’ve got the inclination to do the whole thing I’ll decide then. I do have to pull the subframe out at some point as I’ve non V-Spec diff to put in so if that’s done in this round of mods then I will paint above it at the same time. Should get all of the body deadener stripped by tomorrow so ready to start seam sealing and slapping a bit of bog around by next week.

#escalation If I'm as bad at spray painting as I expect I'll be, I've really got myself in a world of hurt... I've decided that it would be stupid NOT to paint under the car until at least passed the end of the gearbox. That way when I decide to finish full resto on the back half at least I don't have to take the engine and gearbox out again. All I'd need to take off would be the tailshaft and everything behind that. I'll tidy up the sill sections as best as possible (they're not great but far from the worst I've ever seen) and seam seal and paint them at the same time. The floor and myself are currently covered in a shit tonne of shredded tar... Wish me luck digging myself out of THIS hole....

Sexy billet goodness!! 🤤🤤